No Need to Ask
If you have a child, you know what it is like. The countless instructions and reminders of "how things go around here" and what to do and not to do. We are the parents, it's our house and they are our responsibility, so obedience is important for their own safety and well being. Allowing a child to rule the home is a preposterous idea.
Sometimes, they come to us with desire in their eyes and ask permission to do something we've already made clear is unwise or even unacceptable. It's in those moments that my face turns still...speachless dumbfounded expression. Have they not heard my years of instructing on this point? So, sometimes, I say "fine then...go ahead...see what happens when you ignore me". Then watch from a distance until they learn from experience that prudence is virtue, and following your heart is a vice.
That is how I imagine God feels when we make a decision that His word already addresses as wrong, and then we say...
"I prayed about it"
Talking to God about something He already spoke to us about...and there is very little, if nothing He hasn't addressed in the Word...by precept or principle...is not our spiritual seeking, but rather, our deceptive desires at work. We'd rather talk than listen. We'd rather ask quick permission than accept His will, or go figure it out in the pages. Saying "I prayed about it", doesn't make our motives magically good...and motive is everything...and He knows them, even when we don't.
Go to the Word. Listen first. Then ask questions.
Sometimes, they come to us with desire in their eyes and ask permission to do something we've already made clear is unwise or even unacceptable. It's in those moments that my face turns still...speachless dumbfounded expression. Have they not heard my years of instructing on this point? So, sometimes, I say "fine then...go ahead...see what happens when you ignore me". Then watch from a distance until they learn from experience that prudence is virtue, and following your heart is a vice.
That is how I imagine God feels when we make a decision that His word already addresses as wrong, and then we say...
"I prayed about it"
Talking to God about something He already spoke to us about...and there is very little, if nothing He hasn't addressed in the Word...by precept or principle...is not our spiritual seeking, but rather, our deceptive desires at work. We'd rather talk than listen. We'd rather ask quick permission than accept His will, or go figure it out in the pages. Saying "I prayed about it", doesn't make our motives magically good...and motive is everything...and He knows them, even when we don't.
Go to the Word. Listen first. Then ask questions.
"Give ear to my prayer, which is not from deceitful lips." Psalm 17:1
"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?"
Jeremiah 17:9
"The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?"
Jeremiah 17:9
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